Brexit: the rotting corpse of a unicorn

Ahhhh - changing your tune now, so now we'll get by at some point in the future, whilst the world is collapsing around your ears !!!


There used to be a protest song which I think is very apt.

"We'll get by, by and by in that great big world up in the sky,

we'll get by, by and by (It's a lie !!!)"

 

Yet another factory closure and another 500 jobs lost I wonder what the Brexiteers have to say about this ???


McVitie’s owner announces Glasgow factory closure with almost 500 jobs at risk

Douglas Barrie, PA Scotland
11 May 2021, 3:42 pm

The owner of UK brands including McVities has announced plans to close its factory in the east end of Glasgow, putting nearly 500 jobs at risk.

Pladis has put forward proposals to close its Tollcross site, subject to a “full and meaningful consultation with employees”.

The move would put 468 roles at risk of redundancy with the global snack firm highlighting “excess capacity” across its UK sites.

Under the plans, the Glasgow operation would cease in the second half of 2022 with production moved to other factories.

David Murray, Pladis UK and Ireland managing director, announced the consultation to employees at meetings on Tuesday.

He said: “We know this news will be difficult for our colleagues at Tollcross. Our priority now is to provide them with the support they need during the consultation process.

“Pladis is home to some of Britain’s best loved brands which have been part of the fabric of our society for nearly 200 years.

“In order to protect them for generations to come, we must take steps to address excess capacity in the UK.

“This overcapacity limits our ability to make the right investments in future capabilities to meet the very big changes in our industry.”

As well as McVitie’s , Pladis owns Ulker, Godiva and regional brands such as Jacob’s, Go Ahead and Carr’s.

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Glasgow East MP David Linden said: “Today’s news comes as a total body blow to our community.

“Above all, it’s a massive kick in the teeth to the loyal workforce at Tollcross – many of whom have worked there for decades.

“Since 2017, I’ve been engaging with Pladis around the challenges they face as a business and I was genuinely encouraged to learn that things had started to turn a corner.

“Therefore, news of proposed closure comes as something of a bolt out of the blue.

“My sole focus right now is on engaging with Pladis, local and national Government, as well as the trade unions.

“This is a deeply worrying time for everyone associated with the factory at Tollcross and no stone must be left unturned as we fight to protect local jobs.”

In August 2019, Mr Linden spent a day on the production line at McVitie’s to discover what life was like for a worker at the factory.
The Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar, said: “Throughout the pandemic these workers were told by the company that they were essential to the nation’s response to the crisis.

“But now, after decades of underinvestment, they have decided to close this iconic factory. This is a kick in the teeth to that dedicated workforce and McVitie’s owners must think again.

“This pandemic has created a jobs crisis in Scotland and this news will devastate almost 500 families. My thoughts are with them today.

“We urgently need a jobs plan as part of a national recovery. Ministers both in Edinburgh and London cannot sit on their hands and let more Scots end up out of work.

“They must act urgently to protect livelihoods in the east end.

“Scottish Labour stands ready to work with trade unionists, Scottish Enterprise and both of Scotland’s governments to keep this iconic brand and these vital jobs in Glasgow.”

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One of those trade unions, GMB Scotland, slammed the move.

Its secretary, Gary Smith, said: “This is an utterly shameful decision by Pladis – the lowest of the low after a wretched year.

“Staff have worked through the Covid-19 pandemic because management insist these are key workers, helping this business increase its lockdown sales into billions of pounds, but instead of re-investing some of that money back into the Tollcross plant and its dedicated workforce, management are rewarding them with the closure of their site.

“David Murray has no clue how important this plant is to the local economy or what the implications of its closure will be.

“There has been no indication or presentation of the comprehensive business analysis which the company speaks of, and we’re not prepared to wait for formal consultation either.

“We want full transparency from Pladis immediately on the rationale for this proposal, and GMB will absolutely fight against this closure.”

 

Can't anyone see this is what the EU propaganda all over again. You go into Tesco or any main superstore and tell me where most produce (meat, cheese etc) comes from. The supermarkets have an enormous amount of influence on the entire British economy and they are left to manipulate the economics to their advantage time and time again.
They send out their produce buying teams or what they like to be called, to all the supplying factories around the UK. They will bully each and every plant into driving their costs down or else threaten to buy else where. Huge factories bowing Down to these giants of Britain's every day housholds, where in fact they are just a shop that has control of thousands of factories over the UK and every single one of their employees in their hands.
UK is now back alone as a Sovereign state of its own. We still have the Commonwealth, the backing from every international allay we need. We're diplomatic, we're compassionate, we're the 5th biggest economy in the world, we've won the war on Covid, we won Brexit, our economy is stabilising and boosting forecasts above almost the entire world.
All we were bombarded with since Brexit talks started, were all the experts predicting total UK economy clapps and deep recession from the morning of the Brexit vote. Nothing happened.
Then we had another year and half of experts talking us after brexit that all the banks would move from London, our pound would collapse and uk full recession, that our hospitals would lose all our drug supplies (oh how did the vaccine programme work out in EU). Listen I really could go on and on all night. Don't ask what the Leave supporters have gained. Take a real good look at reality and imagine where we'd be now and what the Remsin supporters would have gained. In the UK, nothing I can see positive yet

 

The UK has been demoralised and bullied by the EU. If we had the influence equal to that of Germany and France then this whole fiasco would never have happened. Its always been about control from our EU power house friend who we incidentally saved their entire future and the the free world as we know it. All the UK ever wanted in return was respect and an equally say on the EU table. Not to be pushed back. It's pretty disgusting how you all look at us after my grandfather, his brothers had to go to war to defend Europe's freedom against Nazi Hittler. His father and uncles went to war to protect all or Europe again against Germany. Britain stood alone so many years after trying to protect life as we know it now. So please. Past is the past. You EU lot should give us the respect we deserve and we can all get on well. Because we have shown our support and respect enough the last 120 years for eartg

 

Ohyeah, yeah, yeah - a load of nationalistic clap-trap !!! - My dad and a couple of uncles were fighting Nazis years before your relatives were 'fighting them on the beaches' !!! firstly in Spain and then on Cable Street in the east end of London.


As to the rest of your diatribe, try opening your eyes and looking around you, Then explain, as I've asked before, why banks have shifted their centres across the Channel into the EU ??? why have McVitie's closed a factory in Glasgow costing nearly 500 jobs ??? Why are the loyalist mob in Northern Ireland protesting at the loss of some of their trade due to the imposition of custom duties ???

 

I think you should see what happens. The UK has been losing factories to our European counter parts for a long time, it's not just come about through Brexit. Plus your whole argument there revolves around 500 jobs in one factory that has happened just because of Brexit. I think it's you that needs to open your eyes. Anyway, we'll never agree so let's agree to disagree. Feel free to message me in 20 years time and we'll discuss how Brexit went.

 

Very true, but that's only because your scumbag 'nasty party' government have significantly failed to invest in uk industries. All Brexit has done is to speed that process into mach 2 speed.

 

I agree that our governments (two parties over the years) have failed in investing into industries in the UK. I work in industry for an Italian owned company. Their British factory is their flagship across the globe. I really hope that the EU flourishes without us but maybe make some alternative plans if things go tits up.

 

..... And since it is an Italian company, there's always the possibility if not probability that they will repatriate the entire company back to Italy to take advantage of the free trade across the EU countries.

 

I would agree with a lot of manufactured goods but what we produce never gets exported. We have plants in every country we sell to.

 

The EU is in a little bit of a worrying state. In an ideal world it would be the answer but it's a flawed ideal. 27 countries ranging from poverty poor to economically rich all sharing the same currency at the same value. Please explain how that is beneficial to the poor countries?

 

So much for 'Brexit' being the savior of our trade with the rest of the EU. Remember we were promised everything would be 'rosy' once we left and were able to draw up our own trade deals with the EU ???

UK trade with EU slumps as Brexit takes its toll – ONS

Holly Williams
25 May 2021, 11:36 am


The impact of Brexit on trading with Europe has been laid bare by official figures revealing that UK trade in goods with EU countries has plunged by nearly a quarter.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said that total trade in goods with EU countries tumbled by 23.1% in the first quarter of 2021, compared with the same quarter in 2018 – seen as the last stable trading period.

But, in the same period, trading with countries outside the EU edged back by a far less dramatic 0.8% in a sign of the toll taken by Brexit disruption and the ending of the transition period.

Trade with Ireland and Germany has taken the biggest knock, with exports to Ireland – one of the UK’s top five exporting partners – tanking by 47.3% between December and January.

Imports from Germany, which is the UK’s largest EU trading partner, dropped 30.5% or £1.7 billion between December and January – the biggest fall in imports by value of goods of any major trading partner.

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While the pandemic has also been wreaking havoc on global trade, the data compiled by the ONS suggests this has been easing back while the Brexit hit has ramped up.

Results of a business poll carried out by the ONS at the end of February revealed that firms named the December 31 end of the EU transition period as their main trading challenge.

But, in contrast, those reporting the coronavirus crisis as their biggest challenge fell.

It comes after figures by the ONS earlier this month showed that imports from countries outside the EU overtook those to Europe in the three months to March 31 for the first time on record.

Total trade – exports and imports – with non-EU countries also surpassed those from Europe in the first quarter, according to the data.

Firms have been hit by increasing red tape and delays at ports since Brexit at the year end, while the Northern Ireland Protocol has caused significant disruption at the Britain and Northern Ireland border.

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But the ONS added a note of caution on the figures, saying: “Trade was already at depressed levels because of the ongoing pandemic and recession.

“It is therefore too early to assess the extent to which the transition period reflects short-term trade disruption or longer-term supply chain adjustments.”

The most recent trade statistics gave hope that EU trading woes started easing at the end of the first quarter, with data showing that exports to the EU climbed by 8.6% between February and March.

Imports from the EU also lifted, up by 4.5% in the month.

However, exports to non-EU countries surged 9.9% in March, signalling a pick-up across the globe.

China and the United States are now the UK’s two top non-EU trading partners and the UK has imported more goods from China than from any other country since the second quarter of 2020.

Chinese goods accounted for 16.1% of all UK goods imported in the first quarter, having increased by 65.6% compared with the same period in 2018.

The ONS said trading with China ramped up since the second half of 2020 as the pandemic had only a limited impact on Chinese exports, with the country the first to bounce back from the crisis.

It also saw surging demand for Chinese manufactured face masks and personal protective equipment, as well as other goods such as telecoms and clothing.

 

Any Brexiteer brave enough to admit they got it wrong ???


Brexit delivered £113bn blow to exports of UK services, research shows
Warning that crisis will ‘get worse as businesses see that there is not much going on in UK-EU negotiations’

Rob Merrick
Deputy Political Editor
@Rob_Merrick
1 day ago
comments

Brexit delivered a staggering £113bn blow to exports of UK services even before the sector was left out of the final trade agreement, new research says.

Industries from IT and finance to business and professional services suffered huge pain from the point of the vote to leave the EU in 2016, experts at Aston University in Birmingham found.

The £113bn cumulative loss was calculated by projecting how the sector would have grown from 2016 to 2019 if the referendum had not taken place – and it had continued on its previous path.

“What we find raises serious concerns about the damage to the UK’s services trade position and the likely spillovers to the economy and jobs related to the services sectors,” said Jun Du, professor of economics at Aston Business School.

But the figure does not include any data for 2020 – because of the distorting effect of the pandemic – or, crucially, for the impact of the actual deal itself.
Services industries have long protested at being “thrown under the bus” – despite the UK enjoying an £18bn surplus in services trade with the EU, against a deficit of £97bn in goods.


Ms Du warned that a trend of services companies moving away from the UK is likely to accelerate as Covid restrictions are lifted and trade resumes.

“The Covid period created difficulties in moving business and individuals [which] slowed down this relocation process,” she told the Financial Times.

 “It will now pick up and get worse as businesses see that there is not much going on in UK-EU negotiations. I think this is only the beginning,”

Since the Christmas Eve deal – which Boris Johnson hailed as “fantastic” – the government has refused to reopen talks on plugging gaps, with a new ‘Partnership Council’ yet to meet.

In March, an inquiry by a House of Lords inquiry raised the alarm over:

* Financial services jobs moving to the continent – after Amsterdam overtook London as Europe's leading share-trading centre.

* The failure to achieve mutual recognition of qualifications – which will have “a serious impact” on architects, accountants and other professionals.

* The loss of visa-free tours by musicians and other artists – which will “make touring prohibitively bureaucratic and expensive”.

* The decision to pull out of the Erasmus+ student exchange scheme – with the replacement Turing scheme failing to “cover the costs” of studying abroad.

Aston’s research found that financial services exports were the hardest hit by the 2016 referendum, as banks, insurers and asset managers moved people and capital from London to EU capitals, to rescue seamless trade.

The other most-affected UK sectors included business services, travel, transport and IT, it concluded.

Ireland’s services exports from 2016 to 2019 boomed by £126bn, but Irish economists have disputed that was a consequence of Brexit.

 

Yet another indication that Brexiteers don't know their arse from their elbow !!!


Food exports to Europe plunge after Brexit

August Graham
18 June 2021, 2:45 am

The UK exported more food and drink to outside the EU than into it in the first few months after Brexit as exports to the bloc nosedived.

Sales to non-EU countries made up 55% of all UK food and drink exports in the first three months of 2021 compared to less than 40% a year earlier, according to data from the Food and Drink Federation.

However, this is not thanks to any major boom in exports to non-EU countries, which only rose by 0.3%, the group said.

It means that overall exports of food and drink sunk to £3.7 billion from £5.1 billion a year earlier.

“The loss of £2 billion of exports to the EU is a disaster for our industry, and is a very clear indication of the scale of losses that UK manufacturers face in the longer-term due to new trade barriers with the EU,” said the federation’s head of international trade Dominic Goudie.

Some of the drop will be down to EU importers having stockpiled goods from the UK ahead of Brexit, the Food and Drink Exporters Association’s John Whitehead said.

Yet, he said, “significant business has been lost as a direct result of the additional bureaucracy, customs delays and costs of trading with the EU.”

He added: “Experienced FDEA members are continuing to battle against inconsistent interpretations of regulations across the EU and having to weigh up whether the time and cost involved is sustainable. We fully support the FDF in pressing Government to boost support for exporters.”

The hardest hit sector was dairy exporters. Milk and cream exports to the EU dropped more than 90% while cheese exports fell by two-thirds.

Across the three months food and drink exports to Ireland dropped by nearly 71%, while to Portugal they dropped 72% and to Spain by 63%.

Next to this exports to East Asia have risen. To China they grew by 28%, by 19% to South Korea and by 6.2% to Japan.

 

So 'Brexit' has been good for the uk - right ???

Perhaps the brexiteers and 'little englanders' would care to comment on this then !!!


UK poorest nation per capita in northwest Europe, research shows
SNP says figures show why Scotland better off breaking from ‘poor man of northwest Europe’

Adam Forrest@adamtomforrest
18 hours ago
comments
Boris Johnson is prime minister of the poorest country in north west Europe based on wealth per head of population, research shows.

Analysis by the House of Commons research library – based on International Monetary Fund (IMF) data – shows the UK lags behind all 13 of its closest neighbours when it comes to per capita wealth.

The 2021 figures show that the UK has a gross domestic product (GDP) income per head of the population of just £31,038 – behind other poor performers France on £32,622 and Finland on £34,187.

Luxembourg was found to have the highest GDP per capita in north west Europe, with more than £80,000 per person – followed by Ireland (£65,411) and Switzerland (£50,015).

Nicola Sturgeon’s party seized on the figures and claimed they demonstrated why Scotland would be better off breaking from “the poor man of northwest Europe”.

The SNP’s deputy leader at Westminster Kirsten Oswald MP said the evidence shows that independent countries of Scotland’s size or smaller “do better” than the UK.

“It’s increasingly clear that independence is the only way to unlock Scotland’s full economic potential – so we can be as wealthy and successful as our European neighbours,” said Ms Oswald.

“The UK is the poor man of northwest Europe – with the lowest wealth per head of any country for the whole of the 21st century, and a wealth gap with our European neighbours that has grown worse over the past two decades.”

The IMF figures also suggest the wealth gap between the UK and its closest European neighbours has widened over the past 20 years.

by around £5,000 in 2000 (7.6 per cent below the average). The gap had increased to around £10,000 in 2021 (16.3 per cent below the average).

Mr Johnson has promised that Brexit will lead to a “national renewal” and boost Britain’s economic opportunities around the world.

But recent analysis by The Independent of recent studies on the UK’s GDP shows the damage done by Brexit equates to a loss of between £400m and £800m a week.

A UK government spokesperson said: “The UK government will continue to deliver for the people of Scotland – our economy is one of the strongest in the world, in large part thanks the strength or our Union.

“Scotland continues to benefit from the £352bn package of coronavirus support, which is one of the most generous in the world and has protected one in three Scottish jobs and more than 90,000 businesses.”

 

Alfonso

None of the trade deals have been better for the UK most are role over cut and paste from what we had with the EU or are far worse for the UK, like Japan and Australia.

And the leavers said we would get a better tomorrow – don’t you remember they told us we would get a better deal with the EU and others immediately – don’t you remember we would get our cake and eat it – we supposedly had all the cards and the German car industry behind us getting a great deal.

“There will be no downside to Brexit, only a considerable upside.”

Also we would have better deals in place with by the time of Brexit, because countries would be knocking at or doors to make better deals than what we had within the EU.

It was David Davis who said back in 2016 that “[Within] two years, before the negotiation with the EU is likely to be complete, and therefore before anything material has changed, we can negotiate a free trade area massively larger than the EU. Trade deals with the US and China alone will give us a trade area almost twice the size of the EU, and of course we will also be seeking deals with Hong Kong, Canada, Australia, India, Japan, the UAE, Indonesia – and many others.”

*

So there were meant to be immediate benefits from Brexit - which as perdicted (by the so called remoaners) haven'ty happened

As to your supposed long term benefits even the Brexit supporting economist Patrick Minford said that leaving the EU would have a devastating result on British industry and farming comparing the effect to what happened to the coal industry.

So can you say why you believe their will be long term benefits from Brexit (beyond hope).

 

So the rest of the uk is now abandoning Northern Ireland - I wonder if Sinn Fein are aware of this and preparing a re-unification battle !!!


Brexit: David Frost admits it’s ‘too much trouble’ for firms to trade with Northern Ireland
It’s ‘reasonable’ for British firms to give up, says deal negotiator – adding, ‘They decide it’s just not worth it’

Rob Merrick
Deputy Political Editor
@Rob_Merrick
13 hours ago
comments

David Frost admits it’s ‘too much trouble’ for firms to trade with Northern Ireland
David Frost says he understands why businesses are abandoning trade with Northern Ireland because his Brexit agreement has made it “too much trouble” to carry on.

The negotiator of the deal – which created a border in the Irish Sea – admitted he had not fully foreseen the “chilling effect” of the punishing new red tape, which has left smaller firms facing higher costs.

There are “companies in Great Britain who decide that it’s all too much trouble, reasonably enough – can’t be bothered to engage with the process,” Lord Frost acknowledged.

“They are often SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] and micro-businesses. Dealing with this is a significant call on their time and they decide it’s just not worth it,” he told a parliamentary inquiry.

“That’s why you are seeing some of the trade diversion and supply-chain issues to Northern Ireland that we’re seeing.”

• Is the government heading for a new confrontation with the EU over Northern Ireland?
• Northern Ireland Protocol agreed with EU by Boris Johnson is ‘not definitive’, says Brexit minister

The admission came ahead of Lord Frost unveiling a new “approach” to the Northern Ireland protocol next week, sparking fresh tensions with the EU.

The government insists that the recent three-month truce over the sale of chilled meats and availability of medicines has failed to solve the crisis caused by the protocol.

Brussels has been accused of “intransigence” in the ongoing talks and of a “lack of understanding of the sensitivities in Northern Ireland”.

Questioned by a Lords committee, Lord Frost refused to set out what his new approach might entail – beyond the aim to make goods “flow as freely as possibly between Great Britain and Northern Ireland”.


* Revealed he expected £500m to be spent on trader support services, saying: “That is the cost of the protocol.”

* Rejected the EU’s insistence that there is no alternative to the protocol, pointing to a future consent vote at Stormont, and asking: “Then what is that vote about?”

* Argued it would be “inconceivable” to press ahead with protocol-style arrangements after a no vote, warning: “The politics would be quite significant at that point.”

The comments came as the fishing industry accused Tory MPs who had hyped the potential gains from Brexit of going “very quiet” as those benefits failed to materialise.

The National Federation of Fisherman’s Organisations protested that nothing was now heard from even the “most vociferous supporters” on the Conservative benches.

Peter Hain, the Labour former Northern Ireland secretary, warned that Lord Frost had lost the trust of unionists, nationalists, the EU and the Dublin government, saying sarcastically: “That’s a pretty successful negotiation, isn’t it?”

The EU accuses the UK of failing to abide by the protocol – by introducing checks at Northern Irish ports and by supplying data on cross-sea trade – but London blames an over-zealous implementation.